Jack Nicklaus

Just like Arnold Palmer five years ago, Jack Nicklaus crossed the famous Swilken Bridge on the 18th fairway at St. Andrews one last time in what is sure to be an emotional farewell.

Only with Nicklaus, any sorrow will be compounded by a season in shambles.

The 60-year-old Golden Bear, whose 18 major championships are the standard by which everyone is measured, didn’t expect to whip Tiger Woods. He doubted he could win yet another major, although he never said never.

“I may fool a lot of people,” he said last December at his home in North Palm Beach, Fla., where he laid out plans for one last season of playing all four majors and more regular PGA Tour events than he had in five years.

But Nicklaus embraced reality, too, when he followed that by saying, “I may fool myself.”

In almost every case this year, he has, including missing the British Open cut Friday, shooting 77-73.

After a practice round Tuesday on the Old Course, Nicklaus looked back on a season in which he has failed to break 70 in six tournaments on the PGA Tour, and only shot in the 60s twice on the Senior Tour.

“What I had hoped to do at the start of this year was to play well enough to be competitive, and when you’re competitive you can have some fun,” Nicklaus said. “I’ve struggled in every tournament I’ve played in. The first two rounds at Augusta is the only place where I had a little bit of fun. That was about it.”

Nicklaus was on the leaderboard after two rounds in the Masters before he was nearly blown off the course by some of the worst weather he can remember. He closed with rounds of 81-78 and tied for 54th.

He played his final U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, where he won in 1972 and thought he had claimed a fifth title in 1982. This time, he missed the cut with an 82, his worst U.S. Open score in 160 rounds dating to 1957.

Before he headed to the Old Course last Tuesday, Nicklaus was served yet another reminder of a season that has hardly gone according to plan.

His 31-year-old son, Gary, left St. Andrews for the airport.

The enthusiasm Nicklaus brought to the 2000 season was due in part to his health--he finally took care of that hip problem by getting a ceramic replacement--and in part to Gary, who earned his PGA Tour card for the first time.

Nicklaus arrived in Scotland on Monday and drove straight to Lundin Golf Club to watch Gary try to qualify for what would be their first Father & Son outing in a major. Gary had a 3-under 68, but missed by five strokes.

Gary went back to America for the B.C. Open, trying to earn enough money over the next three tournaments to get into the PGA Championship at Valhalla Golf Club, a course Nicklaus designed.

“His goal right now is to at least play one of the big tournaments,” Nicklaus said.

As for the Golden Bear?

His goals haven’t changed. He refuses to give up. Nicklaus says he is hitting the ball as well as he has in years, which was affirmed to him by Robert Baker, Gary’s swing coach who walked the Old Course with Jack.

The trouble is putting, which leads to a lot of weekends off.

After two practice rounds at St. Andrews, Nicklaus was still waiting for his first one-putt green, and thus his first birdie.

“My distance has been very good. I am right around the hole,” Nicklaus said. “It’s just that the ball is not going in. We go through periods like that, and I’m just going through a little bit longer period than I normally do.”

Just as Woods is doing now, Nicklaus used to intimidate with his power and dominate with his putter. Whenever there was a putt to be made, Nicklaus was the consensus pick as the one you wanted standing over it.

“I’ve been almost able to will the ball in the hole through most of my life,” he said. “When I wanted to make a putt, I’d figure out how to get it in the hole.”

One thing that hasn’t changed is his feeling for St. Andrews.

Despite a wretched scouting report from his father, Nicklaus fell in love with the Old Course when he first saw it in 1964, a runner-up finish to Tony Lema.

He returned in 1970 and won his second British Open by beating Doug Sanders in a playoff, then added a third claret jug in 1978 at St. Andrews.

“I think this is probably the most special place of all to win a golf tournament,” he said.

If only his sendoff could have been one to remember.